


Drought

by diefleder_tey



Category: Original Work
Genre: Extra Trick, Horror, Multi, Murder, POV First Person, Suicide, Trick or Treat 2020, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:28:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27014296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diefleder_tey/pseuds/diefleder_tey
Summary: The rains never stop for long.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12
Collections: Trick or Treat Exchange 2020





	Drought

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Allekha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allekha/gifts).



> An extra trick fic for you!

The rains stopped, and my roots ran dry. My leaves and petals curled, crumbled to dust as they fell.

"It's ugly, papa," She said. "Cut it down."

"Now, now," He replied. "It may bounce back. Give it time."

Reaching deep, past a torrid earth that had abandoned me, unraveling the most inner, rotten pollen of my core, I set it adrift on the winds from my tips, snowing on the ground where my beautiful petals once lay.

"See?" He said, taking a deep breath. "That sweet smell? It's doing fine."

She scrunched up her nose in disgust. "It stinks."

Dry days passed, until finally She slit his throat at my base, with her kitchen knife, the blood from the veins of his neck running down his pallid skin and into my waiting hands. I drank. Soaked my roots to vibrance and my bark to its fill. She followed him soon in death, guilt and shame at what She had done, raining her life down into the soil on top of where He lay. Buds sprouted and petals bloomed; the moss covered their bodies at my trunk and I was beautiful once more. 

For a time.

"We'll have to get rid of it," another He said. "Cut it down, so we can plow here."

"Really? Pity," another She replied. 

Like a child scattering the seeds of a dandelion, I blew sweetly into the air, my pollen dusting her braids and landing on her shoulders.

"I've been thinking," She said. " _Now_ might be a good time to try for a baby?"

"We don't have time for that," He answered.

She hung herself from my branches the season after, an odd ornament amongst the pink petals and twigs. He reached to cut her down and her body and his sin were too heavy, cracking his neck on my branches. And so I drank, fulfilled once more, new food pulled down into my roots, tangled around their limbs, their soon to be moss covered bodies.

"It's so odd," They, newer to my soil, said. "A cherry tree with red blossoms?"

"Listen to me, we have to get out of here," another They answered. "Before they find us."

They pressed their bodies up against my trunk, hot breath across my barked-skin and deep moans into my branches. All the while, I showered them, drifted my sweet scent down to seep in with the sweat and the desire. 

"This place will kill us."

And so They both left, before I could have my fill. 

The rains stopped and my roots ran dry.

But the city encroaches closer every day, its boundaries spread farther and faster than even the wind. And as my last petal falls, carrying the sweet smell of my pollen out to the crosswalks, the parks, the people outside, I know.

The drought cannot last forever.


End file.
